The current recession
rocking the Nigerian economy has hit one of the biggest employers of
labour in the country outside of the government as the Dangote Group,
belonging to Africa’s richest man, Aliko Dangote, has fired 48 members
of staff.
Punch gathered that
those sacked were made up of 36 expatriate and 12 Nigerian workers from
the group’s headquarters and one of the subsidiaries, Dangote Cement
Plc.
Though
no official of the group was willing to speak on the matter on Sunday,
one of our correspondents gathered from highly placed sources that the
decision to sack the workers was not unconnected with the current high
cost of running business in the country occasioned by the unavailability
of foreign exchange and the unprecedented hike in the naira to dollar
exchange rate.
It was
further gathered that the huge amounts in foreign currencies being paid
to the expatriate workers had become a burden on Dangote due to the
steady depreciation in the value of the naira and the difficulties of
raising enough dollars.
Consequently,
the industrialist, according to sources, has decided to replace the
expatriates with Nigerians, who have acquired the requisite experience
on the job, as paying them in naira will be less problematic.
For the
affected Nigerians, it was gathered that most of them had disciplinary
issues, which made it easy for the group to do away with their services.
When
contacted on Sunday, the Group Head, Corporate Communications, Dangote
Group, Tony Chiejina, said he could not speak on the development.
However,
in a letter signed by the President/Chief Executive Officer, Dangote
Group, Aliko Dangote, dated Thursday, October 20, 2016,the firm stated
that it was constrained to take the “tough” decision as economic factors
had affected the cost of production.
The
letter, which was titled: ‘Recent Retirement Exercise’, however,
appreciated those affected for their contributions to the growth of the
group.
The
letter read in part, “This year has been a very challenging year for us
as a business. The unavailability of foreign exchange coupled with an
unprecedented hike in the exchange rate has resulted in increased costs
across the organisation.
“This
called for a proper review and adjustment of our costs across board to
ensure efficiency and effectiveness in the deployment of our factors of
production in a bid to eliminate redundancies that we know exist, which
resulted in some tough decisions, which means losing staff, including
some of our colleagues.
“On
Friday, October 14, 2016, we began the process of staff cutbacks as it
is imperative to review our human capital deployment for the required
cutbacks that would ensure efficiency and eliminate redundancies in the
allocation of human resources.
“This
first phase of this exercise involved the cutback of 36 expatriate staff
across the Dangote Cement Plc and Dangote Industries Limited, and 12
local staff members in Dangote Industries Limited.”
As an
organisation with international operations, the group promised that it
would continue to review and restructure its human capital deployment to
ensure “optimal allocation of skill sets and size of the workforce each
function requires.”
The group urged the workers to shun lateness, improper dressing and other unsavoury behaviours in the workplace.
Bloomberg
had in its latest ‘Billionaire Index’ reported that Dangote had lost
$5.4bn of his fortune this year due to the fall in the value of the
naira and the decision of the Central Bank of Nigeria to ration dollars
to stem huge capital outflows in the wake of Nigeria’s worst economic
crisis.
Dangote
had recently urged the Federal Government to sell off the Nigerian
Liquefied Natural Gas Company and other dormant but huge
capital-generating enterprises and reinvest the proceeds in the economy
to bring the country out of the current economic recession before the
end of the fourth quarter.
Dansa
Foods Nigeria Limited, which claims to be a member of the Dangote Group,
has reportedly been unable to pay its workers for the past six months.
The
company is being run by Alhaji Sani Dangote, a brother of Aliko, who is
the Executive Chairman, with Aliko’s shares embedded in the firm.
Multiple
sources in the Dangote Group claimed that Dansa Foods was not part of
the group but was an independent company owned and run by Aliko’s
brother.
However,
in a statement announcing its participation at the just concluded Lagos
International Trade Fair, the group listed some of its subsidiaries as
Dangote Sugar Refinery, Dangote Agrosacks, NASCON Allied Industries Plc
(Dangote Salt), Dangote Rice Limited, Dangote Cement Plc and Dansa Foods
Limited.
It was
reported that the company, which produces Dansa Juice and other goods,
had laid off more than half of the workforce following dwindling sales
and high cost of production caused by high exchange rate of the naira.
It was
gathered that the company had suspended the production of Dansa Juice
and other products, and was only producing Mowa Bottle Water.
As a result, the workers have reportedly embarked on a strike to press home their demand.